When I met my husband at 21, my eyes sparkled with love! Such a glorious of all human experiences it is to fall in love. The smile never left my face, even when I kissed him. He would be forced to kiss my teeth and then laugh and tease it me for it.
We dated for 3 and a half years before getting married, and we get married it was because we both were so madly in love we couldn't possibly imagine life without the other in it. We didn't marry because I got pregnant or some other excuse. No I married him at 24 and him to me at 25 and we stayed that way for a blissful nine months.
In nine months, my hopes of the fairy tale ending came crashing down. After just a short nine months, my husband experienced a severe psychotic episode...the first I had ever seen in our entire 4 year relationship and I was told he has schizophrenia and from there, life would never be the same.
I remember the pole in the hospital I leaned against whilst sobbing I remember his dad's uncomfortable touch upon my back trying to comfort me but not really knowing me. I remember feeling so utterly alone.
Somehow three years later events had drastically changed for the better. The medication was working, he had a new desire and drive to become and engineer and he enrolled in school to complete his electrical engineering degree. I had finished graduate school and I was excited to move onto the next stage of life. My husband graduated college, found full time steady employment, and I had our two babies and was able to stay home with them part time.
Life is hard as a mom. I didn't want it any other way and I'm so grateful I was there, but it was hard. Days would go by where I didn't shower and I wore the same hoodie or alternated hoodies that were easy to zip so I could nurse. I felt unattractive and unattracted to anything or anyone. My husband was providing for us but I felt ugly and unfullfilled.
My daughter was dx with severe speech disorder and I was devastated. Here I was a speech therapist and my daughter had a severe disorder I wasn't equipped to fix. I started attending conferences, workshops, and training and was focusing on my career again under the guise of helping my daughter. My purpose and passion were born. I new treating kids with apraxia was to be my life. I worked at the schools, dabbled in a fledgling private practice, and busted my butt to be a good mom.
I started to butt heads with my husband. Whose career is more important? He accused me of always taking priority, I accused him of not being supportive.
Seven years after the birth of my daughter he landed in a psychiatric ward for the second time and life was never to be the same again. It started a series of hospitalizations occurring each subsequent year. Turns out we were lucky for my job because no one else could have afforded his attorney fees and hospital bills from his psychotic episodes.
My career was thriving but my heart was hurting. I missed being mom to my kids. I hated I was the parent always working. To make it worse, when he was sick, he would tell me I was choosing money over my kids. I would become incensed. If it wasn't for me we would all be in a homeless shelter! I was the one supporting all of us. Such is Mania though. Mania is mean and a jerk.
Tonight March 26th, 2019, a short 3 months after my husband's last psychotic episode, I write to put things in perspective. He is currently unemployed and has been for over a year now aside from some odd jobs. There is a season to everything and we can either look at the negatives or focus on the positives. Life is always going to be hard in some capacity. That might be part of the definition of living. There is NEVER a perfect season and there will always be something to complain about.
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